Chapter 22
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— Dutch —
Saturday afternoon at Murphy’s Hardware shouldn’t have been a minefield, but apparently nowhere in Millfield was safe from my past anymore.
I was loading lumber into my truck bed, working on some repairs to my back deck, when I heard the familiar sound of Crystal’s laugh from across the parking lot.
She was leaning against a beat-up Camaro, smoking a cigarette and talking to two other women I recognized from various club parties over the years.
I focused on securing the load. With any luck, I could be gone before she noticed me.
No such luck.
“Well, well. Speak of the devil and he shall appear.”
I turned to find Crystal sauntering over, her bleached blonde hair catching the afternoon sun.
She was wearing the kind of outfit that left nothing to the imagination—cropped tank top, tiny shorts, makeup applied with a trowel.
The kind of woman I’d once found irresistible and now just found pathetic.
I’d barely seen her since that day in my office.
After Indira left, I’d made it explicitly clear to Crystal, the other club girls, and my brothers that I was done with meaningless sex.
No more easy fucks. No more warm bodies to fill the emptiness.
She still came around the clubhouse—still fucked some of my brothers, from what I’d heard—but I didn’t give a shit about that.
She could do whatever she wanted, as long as she knew her place.
And she did. Every time she’d spotted me at the clubhouse over the past year, I’d given her a hard stare that sent her scurrying in the opposite direction as fast as her cheap heels could carry her.
Apparently, catching me alone in a parking lot had made her bold again.
“Crystal.” I nodded curtly and went back to my lumber.
“Heard your little girlfriend moved back to town,” she said, moving closer. “Brave of her, considering.”
I straightened up, my jaw tightening. “Considering what?”
“Considering how things ended between you two. Must be hard, knowing she walked in on us.” Her smile was all teeth and malice.
“Remember that evening, Dutch? You had me on your desk, my legs wrapped around you, fucking me so hard the whole thing was shaking. And then little miss perfect just walked right in.” She laughed, a cruel sound.
“The look on her face when she saw us...” She laughed, a cruel sound. “God, that was priceless.”
My blood turned to ice. The worst day of my life was burned into my memory. Indira’s face in the doorway the devastation in her eyes as she watched me destroy everything we’d built.
“That was a mistake,” I said firmly.
“Was it? You seemed pretty into it. Kept telling me how good it felt—”
“Crystal, stop.”
But she was enjoying this too much to quit. “Wonder what it was like for your precious Indira? Standing there watching the man she loved balls-deep in someone else?”
“Excuse me.”
I turned to see Indira walking across the parking lot, carrying a bag from the craft store next door. She looked beautiful in dark jeans and a white blouse.
My heart started hammering. This was it. This was how I lost her again.
“Crystal,” Indira said, her voice controlled but not quite steady. “Still hanging around parking lots hoping to catch men’s attention, I see.”
Crystal’s smile widened, predatory. “Just catching up with an old friend. We were reminiscing about when you walked in on us.” She stepped closer to Indira, and I saw something vicious flash in her eyes.
“You remember that, don’t you? I was perched on his desk with my legs wrapped around him, and you just stood there in the doorway like a sad little puppy.
But here’s the thing, honey—he didn’t even stop right away.
Took him a few seconds to even notice you were there because he was so deep inside me.
So what does that say about how much you really meant to him? ”
I watched Indira’s face and saw it—the flinch.
Just for a second, her carefully constructed armor cracked.
Her hand tightened on her shopping bag, knuckles going white, and something vulnerable and raw flickered across her expression.
The same look she’d had that day in my office, when her world had shattered.
Every muscle in my body coiled tight. I opened my mouth to tell Crystal to shut her fucking mouth, to get the hell away from us, to make it absolutely clear that nothing she was saying reflected how I felt now.
But before I could get a word out, Crystal saw her opening and her smile turned triumphant.
“That’s what I thought. You can play dress-up as his girlfriend all you want, but you’ll always be the woman who wasn’t enough to keep him faithful.
He had you waiting at home, and he still chose me. ”
The parking lot went silent. Even the wind seemed to hold its breath.
For a long, terrible moment, I thought Indira might actually walk away. Her jaw was clenched, her eyes bright with what might have been tears, and I could see her fighting some internal battle.
Then something shifted. Her spine straightened. The vulnerability vanished, replaced by something cold and lethal. When she spoke, her voice was quiet, controlled, and absolutely devastating.
“You’re right,” Indira said, and I felt my heart stop.
But then she continued, her voice gaining strength.
“That evening did hurt. It still hurts. Walking in on the man I loved with his dick inside some club girl he couldn’t even bother to lock the door for.
But here’s what you don’t understand, Crystal. ”
Crystal’s smile faltered.
Indira stepped closer, and I watched her transform from vulnerable to formidable in real-time.
“That was his rock bottom. The moment that made him realize what he’d lost. You think it’s some victory that he was fucking you when I walked in?
You were nothing but a warm body he didn’t even respect enough to hide.
He left his door unlocked. He didn’t even care if someone saw. ”
She leaned in, and I saw Crystal take a step back.
“When I moved on, I waited. I healed. I built a whole new life. And when I dated other men, it was because I was choosing to. Because I had options. Because I was desirable and worthy of pursuit.” Indira’s voice was steel wrapped in silk.
“When he fucked you that night, it was because you were convenient, easy, and meant absolutely nothing. I had men lining up because they saw my value. He had you because you were pathetic enough to spread your legs for a man who couldn’t even be bothered to remember your name. ”
“That’s not—” Crystal tried.
“Tell me, did he look at you?” Indira continued, relentless. “Because I can tell you exactly what the men I dated did. They looked at me like I was the best thing that ever happened to them. Can you say the same?”
The direct hit made Crystal’s face flush red. I remembered it with horrible clarity: how mechanical it had been, how I’d barely looked at Crystal, how I’d felt nothing but hollow satisfaction that evaporated the second Indira appeared in that doorway.
“That’s what I thought,” Indira continued.
“So let’s be clear about something. That was a broken, selfish man who destroyed the best thing in his life and then tried to talk his way out of the consequences.
But this man,” She gestured toward me. “This man doesn’t run from his mistakes.
He owns them. And he sure as hell doesn’t need consolation prizes from club girls who mistake being used for being wanted. ”
I stared at her in amazement. She was magnificent - fierce, controlled, and absolutely devastating.
“Now,” Indira continued, her voice taking on an edge that would have made my brothers nervous, “let me explain something to you about knowing your place. Your place is nowhere near my man. Your place is not speaking to him, not touching him, not even looking at him unless he addresses you first. Because the man standing here today knows exactly what he wants, and honey, it sure as hell isn’t you. ”
Crystal’s mouth opened and closed like a fish. Around us, I became aware of other people stopping to watch the confrontation, including Handful and Colt who had emerged from the auto parts store.
“So here’s what’s going to happen,” Indira said, stepping even closer to Crystal.
“You’re going to get in your car, drive away, and stay the fuck away from us.
Because if you approach him again, if you so much as breathe in his direction, you won’t be dealing with a man looking for an easy lay.
You’ll be dealing with me. And trust me, sweetie, I’m a lot scarier than he ever was. ”
Crystal looked to me desperately, probably expecting me to defend her or tell Indira to back off.
Instead, I crossed my arms and smiled. “You heard her.”
“Dutch—”
“The lady told you to leave,” I said. “I’d suggest you listen.”
Crystal’s face crumpled with humiliation. She spun on her heel and practically ran to her car, her friends scrambling after her. They peeled out of the parking lot like their asses were on fire.
The silence that followed was deafening.
I turned to Indira, who was watching Crystal’s car disappear. But I could see her hands were shaking slightly, and when she met my eyes, there was something vulnerable there beneath the armor.
“That was...” I started.
“Necessary,” she finished, but her voice wasn’t quite steady. “Someone needed to put her in her place.”
“You’re not okay though. Are you?”
She took a shaky breath. “No. Not entirely. Hearing about that day, having it thrown in my face...” She looked down at her hands. “It still hurts, Jacob. Knowing what you did. Who you were. It probably always will hurt, a little.”
“I’m sorry,” I said, the words completely inadequate. “I’m so fucking sorry—”
“I know you are.” She looked up at me, and I saw the complexity in her expression—hurt and strength, vulnerability and power, all existing at once.
“And I meant what I said to her. That was your rock bottom. The moment that made you change. But that doesn’t erase what it cost you and me to get you there. ”
“No, it doesn’t.”
“But I’m choosing to build something new with you anyway.” Her hands stopped shaking, and something fierce entered her expression again. “And I’ll be damned if I let some club girl make me feel like I’m not enough. I am enough. I’ve always been enough. You just didn’t know it then.”
“I know it now.”
She smiled, and this time it reached her eyes. “Yeah, you do. And watching you stand there and let me handle it? Not trying to protect her, not trying to minimize what happened this time? That meant something.”
From across the parking lot, I heard Handful’s voice: “Holy shit, Dutch. Your woman just destroyed Crystal without breaking a sweat.”
“Yeah, she did,” I called back, not taking my eyes off Indira. “And it was fucking beautiful.”
Indira laughed, a real laugh that made my dick hard. Fuck, I missed hearing that laugh.
“Go on,” she said, squeezing my hand before letting go. “I need to finish my errands. But Jacob, next time a woman from your past tries to cause drama, just step back and let me handle it. I’m much better at female psychological warfare than you are.”
I watched her walk back toward her car, and caught sight of my brothers’ faces across the lot. They looked stunned, impressed, and maybe a little scared.
Good. They should be. Because that woman wasn’t just beautiful and smart and fierce.
She was mine. And God help anyone who tried to suggest otherwise.
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Later that evening, I was at the clubhouse going over the week’s receipts when my phone buzzed with Glitch’s name.
“What’s up, brother?”
“Got something you should know about.” Glitch’s voice was careful, the way it always got when he was working through information. “Remember that burner number I flagged a few months back? The one connected to the Wolves?”
I set down my pen. “Yeah.”
“Got a hit on it tonight. Incoming call from Crystal’s cell.”
Glitch had been keeping quiet tabs on Crystal’s movements ever since Indira came back—nothing invasive, just monitoring her phone activity for exactly this kind of bullshit. I hadn’t asked him to do it. He’d just started, and when I’d found out, I’d asked him why.
“Don’t know,” he’d admitted. “Just a gut feeling. The way she looked at you after you cut her off—that wasn’t wounded pride, brother. That was something uglier. And now your girl’s back in town?” He’d shrugged. “Seemed worth watching.”
I’d learned a long time ago to trust Glitch’s instincts. Smart move, apparently.
Handful, who’d been nursing a beer at the bar, wandered into my office. I held up a finger.
“Glitch, you’re on speaker now. Say that again for Handful.”
“Crystal called a burner phone about an hour ago. The burner’s registered to a tower near Wolves territory—same one their VP uses.”
Handful’s eyebrows shot up.
“How long was the call?” I asked.
“Eight minutes. Long enough to run her mouth about something, but I couldn’t get audio.”
I felt a flash of irritation rather than concern. Crystal was petty, vindictive, and humiliated. Of course she’d try to stir up trouble. But what could she possibly tell the Wolves that would matter? Club girls didn’t know shit about our actual operations—we’d learned that lesson years ago.
“Let me guess,” I said. “She’s telling them about our gun routes? The warehouse locations she doesn’t actually know? The ATF investigation she heard about third-hand at a party years ago?”
Glitch’s laugh was dry. “Probably. Girl thinks she knows more than she does.”
“Exactly.” I leaned back in my chair. “We’ve never been stupid enough to discuss real business around club girls. Whatever she’s selling, it’s outdated or wrong.”
“Still want me to keep an eye on her?”
“Yeah. But don’t lose sleep over it.” I picked up my pen again. “Crystal’s a nuisance, not a threat. She doesn’t have anything the Wolves could actually use.”
“You sure about that?” Handful asked, his eyes narrowing.
“I’m sure. She’s been hanging around the edges for years, but she never had access to anything that mattered. Best she can do is confirm we exist, and the Wolves already know that.”
Glitch made a noise of agreement. “Fair enough. I’ll let you know if anything else comes up.”
After he hung up, I went back to my receipts. Crystal was a problem that would solve itself. She’d run her mouth, realize she had nothing of value to trade, and eventually slink off to cause drama somewhere else.
I had more important things to focus on. Like the woman who’d just staked her claim on me in front of everyone in a retail parking lot.